Have you ever found the perfect new team member? A person who fits exactly what your organization needs? Hopefully you have had this experience at least once in your leadership career. It is rewarding for everyone when you bring in the right person at the right time. However, there are cases when you find out this person actually is not the perfect fit. Worse, maybe they were perfect, but after a while decided it was time to move on to another opportunity. Either way, there are some important lessons to learn and use in order to move forward when this happens.

There is no argument that effective leadership requires a variety of competencies in the leader’s toolbelt. Some of these tools include effective communication, inspiring, directing, creating vision, strategic thinking, building relationships, adaptability, drive, execution and emotional intelligence. Coaching is a relatively new tool for the leadership toolbelt. Like all the other leadership competencies mentioned, coaching is not the only tool for leaders; however, it is an important one.

There are many misconceptions of what coaching is and even how to use it, and leaders often think they are coaching when they are not. For example, a leader meets with a team member to discuss a challenge, situation or area for improvement and basically tells the employee how to resolve the problem. He or she may tell a story of resolving a similar situation. Next, the leader encourages the team member to “get out there and make the changes.”

Does this scenario sound familiar? Although this approach may have a place in leadership (in fact, it’s more like mentoring), too often, it becomes overused. When a leadership competency is overused, it becomes a weakness.

Read the article in it's entirety here: http://www.trainingindustry.com/blog/blog-entries/add-coaching-to-the-leadership-toolbelt.aspx

We live in a fast-paced, ever changing, and complex world. As leaders we are constantly looking for more effective, efficient, and productive ways to push both ourselves and those that work with us. According to research recently published by Gallup, employee disengagement costs American organization up to $550 billion in lost productivity per year. That’s $2000 per employee per year. It is clear to see from these numbers that the cost of disengagement and boredom among your employees is staggering. 

  "Man cannot live on bread alone, he must have peanut butter (James A. Garfield)!" Similarly leadership does not stand alone, it must get results, and that means achieving well formulated goals. By definition, a destination is inherent and you MUST know where your are going or, as oft quoted Yogi says, "If you don't know where you're going, any path will get you there." 

When you think of doing a stakeholder analysis, doesn’t it seem a little mid-20^th century? When you look at it, after all is said and done, isn’t it really just names? Scrawled black and white names hanging there on the page in front of you with no depth whatsoever. However, there is something much, much more going on behind each and every name on that page.  Every one of those colleagues, every one of those team members, has an emotional makeup that pushes them to make all sorts of decisions, both logical and illogical. Those humans, every individual named on that page, are flesh, blood, and bones so why not take that fact into consideration the next time you perform a stakeholder analysis?

I understand, it might seem a little challenging to project your EQ onto something as two-dimensional as a stakeholder map. “I mean” you might be thinking “isn’t the stakeholder analysis supposed to simply be a strategic planning tool? Don't make this more difficult than it needs to be!”  

MSBCoach is committed to partnering with leaders and teams to identify their True North.  One's true north includes living into your values, identifying what it means to you to be your authentic self, and practicing emotional intelligence.  Leadership, executive, and team coaching are effective ways to help leaders and their teams put these principles into practice.  We also offer engaging workshops in being an authentic leader, emotional intelligence, identifying your values, and many others.  You can check out our coaching processes and our list of workshops here.

Why is it there are some people that easily draw crowds at parties and other social gatherings while others struggle to make connections? There are a number of reasons this occurs but surely, the “people magnet” in the crowd has what we define on the MSBCoach Leadership Maturity Model (LMM) as “Advanced People Skills.” Advanced People Skills are not only valuable in daily social interactions but they are essential to good leadership. After all, projects are managed and people are led. And good leaders must be equipped with the appropriate level of job knowledge as well as the people skills necessary to optimize the team’s production and job satisfaction. Advanced People Skills include the ability to motivate and influence others. Someone with this competency is also approachable, open minded, able to read people, and is collaborative. 

Being a “People Champion” is key to great leadership. If you saw the Women's World Cup Final, you may have seen what a “People Champion” can accomplish!

First, nothing happens without a goal (double entendre intended)! You have to know where you’re going and then everyone needed to get there must know too.

We live in a fast-paced, ever changing, complex world. As leaders we are constantly looking for more effective, efficient, and productive ways to do our work and that of those we lead. You probably have read the statistics that the Gallup organization published about the percentage of non-engaged and actively disengaged employees (http://www.gallup.com/consulting/52/Employee-Engagement.aspx). The cost is staggering. Even with jobs in jeopardy during tough economic times, employee engagement has not significantly increased and the reasons for the lack of engagement have not changed. Leadership is still the key but a specific style of leading is needed.

Have you ever noticed when you observe someone else doing something it usually looks easy? Or have you noticed, when you think of something that needs to be done, you think, “it’s not that big of a deal, it should not take them very long”? I am guilty of this on many occasions; although, at least now I am consciously aware of it.

It was the hottest week of the summer so far and the air conditioner in my condo stopped working. Hot and moody, I called in a repair request to my leasing agent. A day passed, and not hearing from them I decided to call again. Not only was the heat rising, so was my impatience. The receptionist for the leasing agent apologized and reassured me that a ticket would be placed for first thing the next morning. ‘First thing’ came and went, the temperature rose, and by now my impatience was growing to anger and frustration. I started to mistrust this company with whom I was doing business. I felt like I couldn’t rely on them to be true to their word, or to contact me if they would be unable to fulfil a request.

It’s happened to us all: At some point in our careers we didn’t know the answer.

We were not prepared. We weren’t sure of what decision to make. And for some – this is our worst nightmare! Especially in the workplace, we are concerned with how our coworkers, bosses or clients perceive us. We want them to feel we are credible and competent additions to the team. But how do we balance that with our innate “human-ness”? The state of being imperfect – but trying to be so?

What causes a leader to fail?

The truth is, there are many things that cause failure at all levels of leadership. There is not a specific “formula” for leadership failure, just as there is not a specific “formula” for leadership success. There are however, actions or behaviors that drive a leader toward the path of success or failure.